In a journalistic coup, after months of chasing leads and pulling strings, we finally landed an interview with CM Punk!

Let’s address some potential confusion right off the bat: we interviewed Cedric Montague “CM” Punk, a respected Cambridge economist specializing in European trade tariff policy, not the professional wrestler of the same name.

The economist CM Punk has authored numerous books about “dynamic stochastic general equilibrium economic models” and is considered an expert on Bayesian analyses of macroeconomics, in much the same way that the wrestler CM Punk is not.

Unfortunately, the economist CM Punk knows dick about wrestling. Here’s an excerpt of our interview.

Kayfabe News: Thank you for joining us, Prof. Punk.

CM Punk: A pleasure. Please call me Cedric. What is this for again?

Kayfabe News: Did you watch Survivor Series?

CM Punk: Uh, is that a movie, or…

Kayfabe News: It was awesome. I was like, there’s no way CM Punk is showing up. Not you, the other CM Punk. Well, I didn’t think you’d show up at Survivor Series either! [laughs] But the show was almost over, and then “Cult of Personality” blares and CM Punk walks out! CM Punk the wrestler, I mean. The place goes nuts. And Seth Rollins is furious — swearing and screaming and throwing up middle fingers. Do you think Seth is legit mad, or is it a work?

CM Punk: I’m afraid I don’t know what we’re talking ab–

Kayfabe News: Punk’s promo on Raw the next night felt a bit soft to me. Did you see it?

CM Punk: Sorry, a promo on Rob?

Kayfabe News: On Raw. Monday Night Raw. Hey, are you related to the other CM Punk?

CM Punk: Do you mean Cecil Merriweather-Pünk, the Oxford astrophysicist, or this wrestler fellow you’ve been talking about?

Kayfabe News: The wrestler.

CM Punk: No relation, it’s just a very unfortunate coincidence. Did you want to talk about my new paper on structural vector auto-regressions in EU market dynamics? My findings indicate an imminent and catastrophic global financial collap–

Kayfabe News: Yeah, I think the fans are going to turn on CM Punk pretty soon. Again, not you. You should be fine. Unless economics fans are as fickle as wrestling fans.

CM Punk: Perhaps you booked this interview with me by accident? You seem more interested in wrestling than economic theory.

Kayfabe News: Well, the other CM Punk wasn’t available. He even blocked us on Twitter. Can you believe that?

CM Punk: I believe it is called X now.

Kayfabe News: Pardon?

CM Punk: Twitter. I think it’s now called X.

Kayfabe News: Oh, right. That’s dumb.

CM Punk: It really is.

Kayfabe News: So, full disclosure, I’m not really interested in economic theory, and neither are most Kayfabe News readers.  You wanna get buzzed and watch WrestleMania X7 with me?

CM Punk: Does a perfectly competitive market equilibrium result in an efficient allocation of resources?!

Kayfabe News: Uh…

CM Punk: Yes, it does. I’d like to get buzzed and watch WrestleMania X7 with you.

[end of recording]

Check out the full interview.